From garage-rock shaman to psych-pop architect, Gus Baldwin has evolved into a bona fide heir to Texas rock’n’roll. The Austin-based singer-songwriter’s self-titled debut solo album, out 24 October on Permanent Teeth, marks his most confident work yet.

This record is the sound of an early-twenties fever dream. A dizzying journey documented in analog hiss.

Baldwin has never been one to be tethered to a single scene. You can hear it in the album’s DNA: the venom of ’70s proto-punk, the chiming, desperate hooks of ’80s power-pop, the psychfuzz of ’60s, and the busted-heart of ’90s indie rock. What’s truly remarkable is how Baldwin bends these disparate eras into something fresh singularly his.

As Baldwin puts it, “It’s a document of my early 20s. Each song on the record is a different piece of me trying to figure out who I was, and how the world was changing around me.”

<a href="https://gusbaldwin.bandcamp.com/album/gus-baldwin">Gus Baldwin by Gus Baldwin</a>

You can’t talk about the solo joint without the carnage that made it. Baldwin led Acid Carousel for six relentless years and twenty-plus releases. But every cage gets too small. His ultimate split from that project on Halloween 2021 was the sound of a jailbreak.

He was “fed up with how things were going, and mostly tired of the psych bag I had been put in.” So, what’d he do? He dove head-first into a prolific, paranoid solo mission during the pandemic, committing to write and record a new track every other day on a 4-track.

The tracklist is a time capsule of emotional wreckage: songs written while he was still trapped in the old band, pressed up against tracks born from the aftermath of that split and the end of a long-term relationship. The 12-track album was bashed out on a legendary Tascam 388 8-track tape machine at a friend’s home studio across 2022-2023. Roky Moon (American Sharks) handled the final sonic surgery and mix, with Joey Oaxaca mastering the whole beautiful mess in Los Angeles.

And if you need to know who’s running the show right now, check the receipts: Gus Baldwin & The Sketch: the band he formed in 2022…just dropped their debut, and, oh yeah, personal invites to support Jack White and roll with Bass Drum of Death. While The Sketch is out conquering the US (and soon the EU), this solo album is the essential the field manual for how Gus Baldwin became the the must-see.

Gus Baldwin is out on vinyl and download October 24th, 2025, via Permanent Teeth. GET WITH IT!

GUS BALDWIN & THE SKETCH LIVE 2025:
10/30 Houston, TX – White Oak Music Hall *
11/01 Dallas, TX – Ferris Wheelers *
11/02 Austin, TX – Empire Control Room *
11/05 Phoenix, AZ – Valley Bar *
11/06 Los Angeles, CA – The Roxy *
11/07 San Diego, CA – Brick by Brick *
11/08 San Francisco, CA – Brick and Mortar *
11/10 Sacramento, CA – Harlow’s *
11/12 Seattle, WA – Madame Lou’s *
11/13 Yakima, WA – Bearded Monkey Music
11/14 Portland, OR – Dante’s *
11/15 Boise, ID – Shrine Social Club *
11/17 Salt Lake City, UT – Urban Lounge *
11/19 Denver, CO – Marquis *
11/20 Ft Collins, CO – The Coast *
11/21 Lawrence, KS – The Bottleneck *
11/22 Columbia, MO – Rose Music Hall *